Middle class leaving San Francisco, census says

http://blog.sfgate.com/techchron/2014/02/07/middle-class-leaving-san-francisco-census-says/

by storborg • 12 years ago

42 58 12 years ago

blog.sfgate.com

codex• 12 years ago

A net loss of 1500 individuals spread out over four years: in other words, almost nothing.

e40• 12 years ago

I can tell you that all the people that have moved into my East Bay neighborhood with good schools have been from SF. People with kids that can't handle the price for private schools and deal with the kid unfriendly nature of SF.

sven98• 12 years ago

You mean the broken needles in the gutters, the people taking dumps on the sidewalk in broad daylight, hustlers trying to sell you crack and meth on every corner downtown, and the general ambient smell of piss?

Come on, nothing builds character like that.

dragonwriter• 12 years ago

People -- particularly in the middle class -- moving from core cities to suburbs to raise children is hardly a new phenomenon, and hardly restricted to San Francisco.

eweise• 12 years ago

Its really the lottery system for the public schools that is the reason most of my friends with kids left SF. People buy houses in certain neighborhoods to guarantee which school their kids attend. Without that guarantee, there is not much incentive to live there.

Fasebook• 12 years ago

Pretty clear that workers came to SF, worked and then left when they were done. Land value inflation worked as intended.

w1ntermute2• 12 years ago

It's amazing how, in a city full of so many supposedly socially conscious people, the government has been able to allow things to get so bad for the middle class.

kaonashi5• 12 years ago

The government can accommodate (or fail to), but most of the driving factors here originate from the private sector.

w1ntermute2• 12 years ago

It is the government's failure to reform zoning laws and its failure to create efficient public transit that are the basic problems here. For those with children, the school system is also subpar.

The private sector hasn't done anything wrong. In fact, the people of San Francisco and their government should be grateful that, in such dismal economic times, the tech industry has chosen to locate itself in a jurisdiction so viscerally hostile to the private sector.

Without tech, San Francisco might have become a Detroit with nicer weather (a situation that the hipsters would no doubt have thoroughly enjoyed).

spikels4• 12 years ago

Bullshit! The private sector is the same in the places the SF middle class are moving to. It's the selfish, short sighted SF government that's causing this.

Crito• 12 years ago

The "private sector" is not the one that allows homeless to clog BART escalators with human shit.

I sure as hell wouldn't want to raise a family inside SF, and the city government is the cause of the reasons why.

ww520• 12 years ago

The government is elected by the people, so really it's the people to be blamed.

baddox• 12 years ago

Elected representatives are not legally bound to follow through with campaign promises or actually represent the desires of their constituents.

rosser• 12 years ago

As an SF resident, I'm pretty confident that my adopted city has the most dysfunctional municipal government in the country.

yeukhon• 12 years ago

The data doesn't show why they are leaving. Renters or land owners? When they count individuals, what is the number of couple leaving SF?

saalweachter• 12 years ago

Once again, the income range quoted in the article seems to correspond to the Thompson & Hickey 2005 definition of "Lower middle class". Mostly likely the people moving in to replace the displayed Lower-middle-classers are Upper-middle-classers making $75,000-$250,000, with only a sprinkling of Upper-classers (aka the 1%).

So once again pitting the middle against itself...

(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lower_middle_class)

sillysaurus2• 12 years ago

$75k in San Fran isn't upper middle class.

1945• 12 years ago

That's for sure. Pulling a figure out of thin air, but with an understanding of the cost of living (I live in the area), I'd say upper-middle begins at around $150+.

3pt14159• 12 years ago

Some areas are going to be more dense with upper middle class than other. Some people are going to earn more than others. If San Fran hadn't stopped itself from growing, it would have plenty of room for both the upper and lower middle class, like Toronto does. Economics isn't a war between the haves and the have nots, it's a manner to allocate resources. We should be focused on increasing production and efficiency, not on making sure everyone in life is equal. That will never happen.

anovikov5• 12 years ago

I think it's some definition of 'middle class' coming from the 1970s and never inflation-adjusted since then. A person making $35K is anything but a middle class in every place i seen, let alone Silicon Valley. Maybe, a lower middle in totally clapped out East European countries like Ukraine.

patio114• 12 years ago

$35k is solidly middle class in Japan (corresponds pretty much exactly to the expected income of a salaryman and his wife during their family's formative years) and in wide swathes of the US, particularly non-metro areas. Representative occupations would include, e.g., early-career public school teachers, public servants, car salesmen, police officers, etc, etc.

icelancer• 12 years ago

$35K is doing just fine in Cleveland, OH.

waterlesscloud4• 12 years ago

You can live middle-classly on 40-60k in most of America still.

Techies seem to be anxious to claim middle-class status, but if you're in a 6-figure household family, you're still pushing upper class compared to nearly anywhere.

And the statistical fact is that if you're $250 k in the US in household income, you are in fact the 1%.

patio114• 12 years ago

About $400k, actually.

Element_• 12 years ago

There was a segment on PBS news hour yesterday that mentioned police officers in California are making 100-250k+ a year and are able to retire with 6 figure pensions & full union benefits. I think most people would class policing as a middle class job.

__xtrimsky• 12 years ago

130k here, I feel lower middle class.

I can't buy a house in NY. I'll have to move upstate for that. I have only one car, second car would be a little bit hard.

billyjobob• 12 years ago

The American English definition of 'middle class' is bizarre and seems to include anyone who has a job and isn't homeless. The correct English meaning of the word is someone who works for themselves rather than a boss in a profession which has a guild to ensure exclusivity, e.g. doctor or lawyer. Or the owner of a small business which employs other people. It's mostly inherited upon birth and has little to do with income. For example the son of a doctor will be born middle class and will maintain that status even if he becomes a wage labourer working for an employer. After perhaps 20 years of wage labour he may then consider he has fallen into the working class. Similarly someone who wins millions on the lottery will never really be 'upper class' because they weren't born of aristocratic stock, although if they maintain their wealth while avoiding work then their children might be.

The people in Silicon Valley working for others are working class.

laurencerowe• 12 years ago

A doctor or barrister would be upper middle class. Working in most other jobs requiring a university education would definitely make you middle class in England.

While the American definition of "middle class" is best translated as "working class" into English English, it seems far from bizarre given it covers someone making the median income.

eaurouge2• 12 years ago

I think it's bizarre that in England your status in society is based mostly on whether you won or lost the birth lottery.

jprinzo• 12 years ago

What's a middle class?

Middle class leaving San Francisco, census says

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